Women, science lose to religion

Thursday

Jul 3, 2014 at 6:00 AM

By Dianne Williamson

Aside from its nod to Mitt Romney that corporations are indeed people and thus entitled to religious superstitions divorced from reality, the Supreme Court offered other troubling take-aways in its Hobby Lobby ruling:

When it comes to the justices and their decisions, gender matters. So does politics. So does their religion.

Five men decided to allow restrictions on women's birth control. All of those men are Republican appointees. All of them are practicing Catholics.

The three women on the court dissented, along with Stephen Breyer, who is Jewish.

So much for the myth of legal objectivity within the marble walls of our nation's highest court. I guess we already knew that ideologies shape the law, but this latest ruling brings it into stark focus.

In the Hobby Lobby case, justices ruled that "closely held" corporations may refuse, because of "sincerely held" religious beliefs, to provide certain contraceptives to female employees as part of their health care package. Hobby Lobby is an Oklahoma-based chain of arts and crafts stores that plays religious music in its shops and doesn't open on Sundays. In other words, its religious beliefs are "sincerely held."

That's Hobby Lobby's right, of course. Unfortunately for its female employees, the Supreme Court decided that those religious beliefs allow the company to withhold four contraceptive measures — two IUDS and two "morning after" pills — that the company falsely equates with abortion.

Let's stipulate that people can't choose their gender, but, unless they're insane, they have control over their beliefs. And regardless of what Hobby Lobby holds to be true, here's the scientific fact: None of these forms of contraception causes abortions. None causes fertilized eggs to fail to implant.

The plaintiffs in Hobby Lobby define conception as the point when the sperm and egg come together to make a zygote. The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, meanwhile, defines conception as the moment when a fertilized egg implants in the uterus. The Supreme Court noted in its decision that federal regulations define conception the same way.

Still, mystical thinking ruled the day.

"It is not for the Court to say that the religious beliefs of the plaintiffs are mistaken or unreasonable," read the majority decision, which assured us that the ruling doesn't "necessarily" mean companies can expect exemptions from other medical care based on religion.

But it didn't directly rule it out, either. So unless the court admits that it favors Roman Catholicism over other religions, what's to prevent a company owned by conservative Muslims to ban female employees? Why can't a corporation run by Jehovah's Witnesses deny blood transfusions to its workers? How about if the Scientologists denied Prozac coverage to depressed employees?

Three more questions: How much longer can we allow irrational religious belief to trump science and reason? How come, whenever someone takes a stand based on religion, it always seems to affect women who want to have sex without getting pregnant? And why doesn't anyone ever take away men's Viagra?

It hasn't been a banner week for women's reproductive health rights. Last Thursday, the Supreme Court struck down Massachusetts' 35-foot buffer zone around abortion clinics, which will allow protesters to more easily harass and humiliate women seeking legal abortions.

Now, with its latest ruling, females are once again the targets of those whose beliefs conflict with modern science and medicine. But if corporations are people, why can't SCOTUS recognize that women are, too?